Bob's Reflections on the Spade-Toed Frog
(10/15/96)

So I'm flipping channels, it's late, I can't find nothing. Nothing. All these
channels and all I can find is some real estate informercial, or psychic hotline bullshit,
or another box set of seventies hits for sale. So I hang on PBS kind of accidental
'cause it's the only thing that ain't showing some idiot with a gimmick. I'm glued.
So I'm watching PBS, it's some nature show. Some kind of frog with big feet. Yeah,
big for a frog, that's what I'm saying. A frog in the desert out there in Arizonacan
you believe that shit? Arizona. So it's the desert, what's a frog gonna do in the
desert? This frog, it stays buried, hibernated-like, all of its life except for when
it rains. It don't rain in a desert. So it rains this one time, and all the frogs
come out and start going at it in the puddles. Tadpoles everywhere. They got to grow
up real quick, before the puddles dry up. Most of 'em eat each other, trying to grow
faster. Most of those don't even make it. Most of 'em get cooked. But I'm thinking
as I'm watching these frogs, so, what about the ones that make it? You're a frog,
you're in the desert, you make a hole and crawl in and wait for the next rain. That's
all you do. Sleep and fuck. So I'm laying on my couch watching PBS and this frog at
one in the morning and thinking, you know something, I think those goddamned frogs
got the right idea. I mean, hell, one a.m. and I ain't doing either one, I ain't doing
nothing. Nothing.